The Top 10 Vulnerability Management Solutions

Intruder is a cloud-based vulnerability management platform specializing in proactive, easy-to-use security management for internet-facing systems. Intruder focuses on providing a straightforward and effective solution for vulnerability management. It continually scans digital assets, identifies vulnerabilities, and offers clear remediation advice.

The key features of Intruder include easy setup and scanning of infrastructure, web apps, and APIs. As a continuous network monitoring solution, Intruder helps reduce your attack surface by automatically kicking off vulnerability scans when changes are detected, such as exposed services or emerging threats. Moreover, Intruder’s customer support team is committed to providing fast and efficient assistance to help resolve issues promptly.

Intruder offers a comprehensive view of your attack surface by combining automated vulnerability scanning, proactive threat response, and continuous network monitoring in a single platform. With prioritized and actionable results, Intruder ensures that users focus on fixing the most pressing issues. Trusted by thousands of businesses worldwide, Intruder is designed to simplify and streamline vulnerability management.

Expert Insights recommends Intruder as a powerful tool for easy-to-manage, external, internal and cloud vulnerability scanning with detailed reporting and compliance with key security regulations.

ESET is a leading provider of lightweight yet powerful endpoint security and management solutions. Their products are trusted by millions of customers globally to protect their data against known and zero-day threats. ESET Vulnerability & Patch Management is their vulnerability management solution, which continuously monitors endpoints for operating system and application vulnerabilities, then automatically applies patches and updates to ensure fast, effective remediation. The platform currently offers protection for Windows operating systems and is set to launch support for MacOS devices soon.

ESET Vulnerability & Patch Management automatically scans thousands of applications and detects over 35,000 common vulnerabilities and exposures (CVEs), and instantly generates reports into the results of each scan within the platform’s central admin console. Admins can use these reports to identify vulnerable software and devices, with the option to prioritize vulnerabilities according to severity for faster identification and remediation of critical issues. From the same console, admins can also see a complete inventory of their patches, including patch names, KB numbers, CVEs, patch severity and affected applications. Once vulnerabilities have been identified and prioritized, admins can either patch them manually or set up automatic patching for fast effective protection, with customizable patching policies that give admins more control over patch deployment—e.g., scheduling non-critical updates during off-peak times to minimize disruption.

ESET Vulnerability & Patch Management is a fully featured vulnerability management solution. It’s available as part of ESET’s XDR solution, ESET Protect, which also includes endpoint protection, server security, full disk encryption, email security, cloud app protection, and multi-factor authentication, all of which can be managed via a single, unified admin console. Being cloud-based, Vulnerability & Patch Management scales easily; this, alongside its robust automation capabilities, makes it well-suited to mid-market organizations and large enterprises. However, the platform’s intuitive, user-friendly interface also makes it suitable for SMBs, and particularly those looking for vulnerability management as part of a wider unified, and easy-to-manage security suite.

Aikido Security is a comprehensive automated web application security and vulnerability management platform. It provides a convenient solution for monitoring, managing and resolving vulnerabilities issues, while integrating seamlessly with your existing tech stack.

Aikido’s key features include cloud posture management (CSPM), open source dependency scanning (SCA), secrets detection, static code analysis (SAST), Infrastructure-as-Code scanning (IaC), and container scanning. The platform also provides comprehensive security offerings, including continuous surface monitoring (DAST), open source license scanning, malware detection in dependencies, and end-of-life runtime scanning capabilities.

Aikido Security provides real-time alerting, prioritized based on severity and risk. The platform reduces time wasted on false positives and unnecessary alerts, with deduplication of repeated alerts, automatic triaging, and custom filter rules. The platform also translates Common Vulnerabilities & Exposures (CVEs) into comprehensible language, enabling teams to swiftly and effectively respond to potential threats.

Aikido focuses on compliance and data security. It is compliant with AICPA’s SOC 2 Type II & ISO 27001:2022 requirements. All scans run within temporary environments that are disposed of post-analysis. The platform doesn’t alter source code, requiring read-only access to your data.

Cisco Vulnerability Management is a risk-based SaaS solution that prioritizes threats according to their relative risk. The tool provides detailed insight and threat intelligence powered by Cisco Talos, enabling fast and accurate decision-making. It employs advanced algorithms and a vast array of internal and external intelligence to offer recommended fixes that aim to reduce risk as effectively as possible.

Cisco Vulnerability Management sources data from over 19 threat intelligence feeds, using real-world exploit data to provide a comprehensive view of emerging threats and shifting trends, and a clearer understanding of an organization’s own risk profile. The platform also offers predictive modeling, which assigns found vulnerabilities a risk score to help prioritize remediation efforts and forecast the weaponization of vulnerabilities. This allows for high-risk vulnerabilities to be remedied before attackers can exploit them. Cisco also provides guidance on which vulnerabilities should be fixed first and their impact on your risk score. Vulnerabilities are prioritized based on their overall risk score, not just how many assets will be impacted.

Cisco Vulnerability Management can ingest vulnerability data from multiple other sources; this allows the platform to function as a single source of data-verified information for both security and IT teams. In addition to this, admins can generate highly customizable reports that show how their organization’s risk posture changes over time. These reports are detailed, yet still easy for stakeholders to understand.

There are currently two versions available of Cisco Vulnerability Management: Advantage and Premier. The Advantage package provides risk reduction through prioritizing vulnerabilities based on risk analysis, offering a self-service environment for IT teams, intelligent SLA setting according to risk tolerance, clear reports with intuitive metrics, and more. Premier includes all features of Advantage and, in addition, enables faster response to new vulnerabilities through optimized vulnerability management workflows and more nuanced threat understanding. Overall, we recommend Cisco Vulnerability Management to organizations that have their own in-house security teams, who can dedicate time to configuring and managing the solution.

CrowdStrike is a key player in providing AI-powered endpoint protection to defend against cyber threats. Falcon Spotlight is their cloud-native platform designed to give organizations extensive visibility over their network, in addition to enforcing robust security policies across the network to remediate network vulnerabilities. The platform includes antivirus, EDR, threat intelligence, and threat-hunting capabilities, all of which run with one unified agent without any hardware required.  

Falcon Spotlight provides powerful vulnerability detection and management capabilities that give organizations instant visibility on emerging vulnerabilities in real-time. This ensures that risks can be identified and understood, thereby reducing any gaps in coverage. The platform collects and reports threat intelligence data, allowing you to accurately understand and prioritize the risks that your network faces. The platform also offers AI-powered risk prioritization to further help with this. Once vulnerabilities have been identified and prioritized, Falcon’s built-in suite of tools addresses them through patching, adjusting configuration, and other remediation efforts. This will improve your security posture, decreasing the likelihood of a successful attack being carried out. 

Falcon Spotlight conducts continuous monitoring, providing real-time updates. This ensures that you have all the information you need when you need it. These insights are shared through a comprehensive and streamlined dashboard. This dashboard also provides insights into historical data and allows you to search common vulnerabilities and exposures (CVEs). 

We would recommend CrowdStrike Falcon Spotlight as a powerful vulnerability management tool for medium to large organizations that are already using the CrowdStrike infrastructure, and that need an advanced stack of vulnerability management tools. Because of its advanced features, this tool is best suited to organizations with a dedicated security team. 

Acquired by Fortra in 2023, Alert Logic Managed Detection and Response (MDR) empowers organizations to detect, identify, and resolve security threats as they affect their network. The fact that this is a managed solution ensures that organizations without extensive IT resource can secure their infrastructure with robust capabilities- the service includes 24/7 threat monitoring, incident validation, and remediation. The platform will help to defend against risks associated with malware and ransomware; data is often targeted while in transit, or while stored in the cloud. Alert Logic’s MDR solution will proactively prevent a broad range of attack types.  

Whilst Alert Logic protects your data and infrastructure, it will ensure that your policies are aligned with relevant compliance frameworks and expectations. Alert Logic provide 24/7 threat monitoring, incident validations, log management, behavior analysis, and threat remediation. The platform provides continuous vulnerability and health scanning; it is able to identify over 91,000 network vulnerabilities and in excess of 8,600 software configuration errors. 

Administrators can gain a comprehensive insight into network status and events through a centralised dashboard. This will highlight missing patches, unauthorized applications, risky configurations, and other potential threats to address. This dashboard is updated in real time, allowing admin to track the progress and evolution of threats and countermeasures.  

Alert Logic MDR is a comprehensive MDR solution that provides powerful vulnerability management features. As such, we would recommend this solution for SMBs looking for an extensive and complete security solution. 

ManageEngine provide a broad range of cybersecurity tools and services to protect and improve access, security, and communications. Vulnerability Manager Plus is an enterprise grade vulnerability tool that can be deployed on-premises to ensure compliance and extensive visibility, with built-in remediation capabilities. ManageEngine’s solution can manage patch deployment, as well as providing end-to-end visibility and assessment of your network. 

Vulnerability Manager Plus develops a comprehensive view of your organization’s entire threat landscape; this includes OS, third-party, and zero-day vulnerabilities, as well as risks associated with security and web server misconfigurations. The platform allows security teams to assess risk and prioritise their remediation actions. All this information is presented in a single, unified console, ensuring that all relevant information is on hand when you need it. 

The platform can monitor all of your endpoints, no matter where they are – this includes locally, a DMZ (demilitarized zone) network, remote location, or even mobile. The solution runs with Windows, Linux, and Mac OS, making it a good fit for all organization types. It is worth noting that macOS does not support the full range of vulnerability management tools. The platform works well with third-party applications, ensuring that your visibility extends across tools. As the system carries out scans, you can conduct audits. The platform checks for over 75 CIS benchmarks. 

We recommend ManageEngine Vulnerability Manager Plus to organizations of all sizes, particularly those using Windows and are in need of a powerful, on-premise tool to manage the entire vulnerability lifecycle. 

Qualys is a leading cloud-based security and compliance provider. Qualys VMDR (Vulnerability Management, Detection and Response) allows organizations to expand their visibility and insight to better understand and remediate the risks facing their organization. Using the data gathered by Qualys VMDR, security teams can prioritize vulnerabilities and assets, and take preventative action. All the while, business risk can be tracked and managed, ensuring that security posture improves over time.  

The comprehensive, cloud-based tool comes with a range of features. It will manage vulnerabilities, detect threats, triage risks, deploy patches, and monitor assets; ultimately, this comprehensive approach improves your security posture and reduces risk. The platform will continually scan your network environment to identify any vulnerabilities at the earliest opportunity. The platform leverages threat intelligence and machine learning algorithms to ensure that threat assessments and triaging is accurate. When relevant, the platform will automatically deploy a relevant software patch for instant remediation against potential risks. 

As it is a cloud-based platform, Qualys VMDR is easy to deploy, scale, and integrate with additional security tools like SIEMs. We would recommend Qualys VMDR for enterprise organizations in need of a comprehensive and robust vulnerability management system. This solution stands out for its automatic prioritizations and built-in patch management capabilities.  

Rapid7 is a Boston-based software provider that offer solutions to increase visibility and improve security within organizations. InsightVM is a powerful cloud-based vulnerability management solution that enhances Rapid7’s on-premises scanning solution, Nexpose. Beyond scanning and monitoring, InsightVM incorporates tracking, reporting, investigation, and enhanced remediation capabilities.  

Rapid7 InsightVM allows security teams to run vulnerability scans across their entire environment (including cloud, physical, and virtual infrastructure). The platform automatically collects data from all your endpoints. Admins can monitor reports through interactive dashboards and enrich findings with contextual data. The platform also allows security teams to streamline remediation activities through automation – particularly of vulnerability patching and containment. The tool can integrate with a range of third-party tools including ticketing systems, patch management solutions, and SIEM tools.  

We would recommend Rapid7 InsightVM for small to midsized organizations across all industries, looking for a powerful end-to-end vulnerability management tool. Rapid7’s offering provides seamless integrations with endpoint security tools already in an organization’s stack. 

Tenable is a dedicated exposure management provider that serves 40,000 organizations worldwide. The platform empowers organizations to identify their exposure and vulnerabilities, then to understand which ones to address first. The Vulnerability Management tool is built on Tenable’s renowned and leading Nessus technology. 

One of the ways in which this platform stands out from its peers is due to its advanced vulnerability scanning capabilities. The solution proactively scans and monitors all assets across an organization’s attack surface. As it scans, it carries out vulnerability assessments using its built-in technology. Through incorporating threat intelligence and vulnerability data analysis, organizations can understand how they should respond to the findings. The platform’s intuitive dashboard makes understanding the findings easy. 

The platform has over 200 integrations that allow you to automate workflows, thereby reducing resources needed and streamlining identification and issue resolution. As a cloud-based solution, Tenable is easy to deploy and scales as your organization grows.  

We would recommend Tenable for mid-sized organizations from all sectors, looking for a powerful, cloud-based vulnerability management tool.